Buffalo Sabres re-sign backup goalie Jhonas Enroth to multi-year contract –NHL offseason Update
Buffalo Sabres on a mission to restore their franchise as one of the best in the National Hockey League (NHL), re-signed backup goalie, Jhonas Enroth, to a multi-year deal on Thursday, July 22, announced the team at the HSBC Arena in Buffalo, New York.
It was learned through a local city newspaper that the contract is a two-year deal and is reportedly worth $1.35 million over the next two-years.
Jhonas Enroth, a 46th overall pick of the 2006 NHL Entry Draft by Buffalo during round-two, has yet to play a full season in the major league. After his selection, Enroth continued to play with his native Sweden leagues and finally played his
first NHL match with Sabres during the 2009-2010 season.
Last season, the 23-year-old goalie, played a career high of 14 games and maintained a save percentage of .907 throughout along with a 2.73 goals against average.
Buffalo Sabres general manager, Darcy Regier, made the announcement and was relieved to have come to mutual terms with the Swedish defender.
"The fact that it was a two-year deal, I think that provides us with depth for two years", Regier said about retaining the Stockholm, Sweden native. "It's an opportunity for him to grow".
Before officially playing in the NHL and following his return from Sweden, Jhonas Enroth began his North American hockey career by playing with Buffalo’s American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate, Portland Pirates, and was mainly used as a recall throughout.
Overtime, Enroth is believed to have satisfied Buffalo management, who have now decided to keep him indefinitely as a backup to their main goalie, Ryan Miller. Using Enroth during the last part of the season after the 2011 NHL All-Star game to fill in for
Miller was the deciding moment for him which paid off.
"Without that I don't know if we would have had the same level of confidence", Regier said. "But the fact that he came in, played the way he played, had the record he had with Ryan [Miller] being injured, really gave him and us a lot of confidence in him”.
Having signed on Jhonas Enroth, Buffalo now only have one task left ahead of them, at that is to decide on what must be done with restricted free agent, Marc-Andre Gragnani.
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